Franklin Zahn; Pacifist Was Jailed for Beliefs

Franklin Zahn, 88, pacifist and activist who was jailed for his beliefs. Born in Los Angeles and educated as an engineer at Caltech, he became a conscientious objector during World War II. But he then rejected civilian public service, the alternative to military service, and joined a noncooperative group that protested their unpaid labor. He eventually was arrested for desertion while working in a hospital and jailed. He served another jail term in the early 1960s when he joined the crew of Everyman II protesting nuclear weapons tests in the South Pacific. Early in his life, Zahn adopted the disciplines of religious asceticism--meditation, vegetarianism, celibacy and voluntary poverty. In 1956, he joined the then-new Wider Quaker Fellowship in Claremont. In recent years he was a resident of the Los Angeles Friends Meeting in South-Central Los Angeles, assisting minority groups. Zahn published his autobiography, “Deserter From Violence,� and had completed a second book, “Alternative to the Pentagon.� On June 3 in Los Angeles.